Setting Goals with New Team Members

(2 minute read)

While it can be an exciting time for new employees when they begin a new role, it helps to provide them some form of focus other than their daily duties.

Research by performance management group Clear Review, indicates that new employees who are made to feel welcome and supported in their formative weeks, are more likely to achieve and excel in their new roles. So, how can leaders and managers contribute to this ideal beginning?

Leaders and Managers can help provide new team members with a greater sense of purpose by setting them a series of short-term goals to achieve in their first few weeks.

These goals should be more than performance expectations, which can initially prove quite daunting to the new hire. They shouldn’t prove too stress­ful or com­pli­cat­ed. Instead, they should be easy to com­plete tasks to get new employ­ees famil­iarised with the organ­i­sa­tion, their new team mem­bers and their role.

Consider the following examples for new team member, Kasey.

Goal: Schedule and attend a meeting with the HR manager to become familiar with the processes and procedures relevant to the new role.

Completion date: 19^th January.

Goal: Review the company’s product training materials to improve knowledge and understanding of the current service offers available.

Completion date: 21^st January.

Goal: Investigate the company’s objectives and goals for the quarter/year.

Completion date: 24^th January.

Goal: Connect with a team-member/colleague who has been in a similar role for the past 6-12 months and ask them questions about their experiences.

Completion date: 27^th January.

Com­plet­ing these short-term goals will allow new team members to get to know peo­ple with­in their team, learn about com­pa­ny poli­cies, and begin to car­ry out tasks that will be expect­ed of them in their role.

These short-term goals also permit the new team member to experience some mini-wins in their formative weeks with the company.

For this process to be really valuable, ensure that the new hire has a leader or mentor to regularly check in with, and to keep them accountable to these actions/goals.